Amniotic Dreams
by Arzosah
Summary: It's amazing what a hyper-developed brain, a set of foreign memories, and seventeen years in a tank can do for someone. Cell reminisces about his years of growth. Please read and review.


Amniotic Dreams

Disclaimer: I do not own Dragonball Z.

**Amniotic Dreams**

"You know, it's kind of cute. And to think it's supposed to eat us," a cold, female voice spoke out of nowhere.

These were the first words I had ever heard, the first sensations I had ever experienced. Should I choose to think way back, to the time before that first moment of self-awareness, all I can remember is a general feeling of being safe. It was a long time after that first voice until I felt that secure again.

But listening to her voice, and that of her companion, took no thought on my part. I'm not even sure I understood what they were saying at the time. Maybe I understood that I was the topic of their discussion, but I'm not sure. It was what occurred after they left that caused the rest of my developing brain to focus its activities. My tank shook violently, and I felt fear. Later I would see irony in the fact that terror was my first internal sensation.

But the tremors stopped and my tank remained undamaged by what I would come to realize upon my maturation was the collapse of the entrance to the lab that housed me. Though I was no longer afraid I still didn't feel safe. It was because I felt… vulnerable, helpless, weak. And at the time I was all of those things; from what I can remember my limbs had barely started to bud at that point.

My feelings of insecurity couldn't compete with the needs of my embryonic body, however, and I soon found it fading as the need for rest rose. I don't know how long I dozed, but I do know that the dreamless sleep didn't make me feel any safer. The drowsy days that followed were an uneventful blur, giving me no accurate way to mark the passage of time; it could have been days, weeks, months, maybe even years before another novel stimulation jarred me out of monotony.

It began as a high, scratchy crackle filtering in through the fluid that sustained me. And then it dissolved into a low, gruff male voice, murmuring words I couldn't make out. And then slowly it became clearer, louder, until I could make out what he was saying.

"You are Cell. You are my ultimate creation, the culmination of a lifetime of work. You will one day be the perfect being."

Something clicked in my mind as I deciphered those first words. I had a name; I had someone who had brought me into existence.

The message repeated itself for a few hours, by the end of which I would be able to recite it by heart for the rest of my existence. And then it changed:

"You have learned much today, and have much more still to learn. Sleep now. Let your new knowledge settle in your mind. Your next lesson will begin tomorrow."

I could not find any reason to do different than the voice had instructed. So I slept. And I dreamed.

The funny thing about dreams is that you can't have them unless you've had experiences. And for me so young and with so few said experiences, it was highly unusual how vivid my dreams were. I ran, I flew, I ate, I fought, I killed, I bled, I died. Things I had never done before, and yet a part of me seemed to think I had. I somehow had memories of things I'd never done.

I woke up from my dreams to the scratchy crackle that signaled the start of my creator's next message.

"You are Cell. You are my ultimate creation, the conglomeration of the greatest warriors this planet has ever seen. Their knowledge and skills are at your disposal. You will one day become the perfect being."

In a sudden, abstract way, I understood the origin of my dreams. They weren't my experiences, but those of warriors who had come before me. And now I wanted more; more memories, more knowledge, more skills that it would be years before I could use. The message began to repeat and my life settled into a new rhythm.

By day I listened to the messages from my creator, Doctor Gero, he eventually told me his name was, and by night my subconscious mind worked its way through those foreign memories. Through my dreams I experienced joy and pain, fear and exhilaration in equal portions. Through the messages I learned more about myself, my origins, and my purpose. I learned the history of a few of my fathers, the biological traits I'd inherited from them, and I learned how I was to attain perfection.

There were two cyborgs, he told me, that he'd made for my benefit. Their numbers were 17 and 18. Contained within them were the codes to unlock my ultimate potential. And if I absorbed both, I would become perfect.

Sometimes in my years of maturity I wondered why he bothered to make me that way. If he could access my potential, why lock it away? Why have me depend on pieces that could go missing? Maybe it was because he wanted me to have a clear goal, but I will never be able to do anything but speculate.

As the months passed my body grew, my limbs took shape, and my knowledge increased. Gero explained the two ways I could gain more power, and I twitched my tail for the first time, little more than a muscular spasm, really. I started to understand the complexities of the relationships between my various 'fathers', slowly coming to know each of them intimately. By the time I reached maturity I knew them all from the inside out.

Months turned into years, and my bones calcified in their cartilage frameworks. My experimental movements within the tank became almost continuous as my muscles firmed and strengthened. My skin became hard as the foundations for my still undeveloped chitinous armor were laid. My head swelled and my thoughts became more abstract. But most miraculous of all was my growing power.

I'm not sure when I first started to feel it, but as time went on I became more aware of its presence. What had started out as a tingle of sparks flitting about my body slowly evolved into a steady stream of raw energy coursing through my veins. I would spend hours tracing its paths, marveling as it pulsed in perfect sync with my heart. More foreign memories came forward, telling me what I could do once I could control the flow and rhythm.

My head became filled with whispers of various chants and ghost sensations of various movements, all of which promised unique ways of focusing this power. One set in particular stood out to me, stood out so starkly that I had to try it. My chant was silent, completely internalized, and the motions could barely be recognized for what they were a part of, but somehow I almost made it work:

_Ka-_**Me**_-Ha-_**Me**_-_HA

My tank shook with the sudden, erratic burst of energy. Not the lightning-white orb of destruction shooting towards its target that it was intended to be, but from what I currently was, an infant, it was impressive.

Years passed, my body grew, and every day the messages played out for me, their length and complexity increasing. And I soaked up every word he said. The more he told me about my future perfection, the less reason I had to doubt him.

But one day, during my seventeenth year, the recordings stopped, and my world became a lonely one. I had almost grown too big for the tank, and I could barely move. I began to panic. I couldn't help it, I'd gone back to that horrible feeling of not being safe. I had not realized how comforting I found Gero's voice before it was taken away. I started to thrash violently, my limbs beating against the safety glass walls that encased me. It rattled in response to my pounding, the rippling rumble resonating through the fluid I floated in. That haunting sound only made it worse.

I was screaming inside, nearly inhaling the nutrient-rich liquid as my power flared sharply, higher than I'd ever forced it. But that did what my muscles could not and the glass shattered. No longer buoyant, I fell to the cool metal floor with the deluge, flailing amidst the shards like a landed fish. The cold air struck me like a blow, and I breathed in a shriek, expanding my lungs for the first time in my life.

For a moment I lay there in the warm puddle of fluid stunned at the realization of what had just happened. I had been born; I was free. The elation I felt could not be described.

A moment to rest, my body getting used to supporting its own weight and supplying its own oxygen, before I shifted and stretched. I felt a sharp ripping down my back and I froze; while it didn't hurt, the sound of damage to one's own body is a disconcerting one. But something made me keep stretching, keep widening the tear. Felt the sensation move down my sides and around my belly, and finally around my cheeks. I pulled back and opened my eyes, which I had not even realized were still closed. And through my blurry, new vision, I could see myself breaking out of an exoskeleton-like structure. I yanked my limbs from it next as I realized what was happening: I was molting.

Stepping out of the slime I stumbled to the side of my previous skin. It was large and heavily armored, clearly designed for protection, most likely against the sharp glass, and nothing else. My new form in comparison was slim and swift, no doubt designed for hunting the two cyborgs I was supposed to absorb.

At that thought an odd clenching started up in my belly, all of Gero's words about my goals coming back to me in an instant. The thought made my body go through the partially practiced motions that I knew I'd need. Barely a few minutes into the world, and I was already prepared to go hunting.

With somewhat off balance movements I sloped my way out of the lab. I would not be thwarted in my goals; I would not be denied perfection.


End file.
